52 comments:

Nnnno. I love cozies, but this doesn't ring like one. If we were told what it was that Elsie gazed at in horror, and if that something was incogrous, or funny, then, yes. As it is, I'd need a killer second sentence to be grabbed.

Again, I'd like to say "Maybe" here but the "horror" was too much telling for me. You need to show her horror with a specific reaction. For example, "Elsie stepped out the airport shuttlebus and immediately wished she could get back on." I'm not saying that you should use this exactly but you need something that shows us her reaction and makes us wonder why she is having it.

"gazed around in horror" doesn't jive with me. Mostly because when I think 'gaze' I think dreamy, lovely, or blank stare. Gaped, gawked, stared in horror. Not gazed, it's too casual. Unless horror is the wrong word. I don't know. Just missed the mark for me.

No. The combination of "gazing" and "in horror" don't work for me for the same reason others mention. The outcome is that I lose confidence in whether I'm going to get authentic reactions/emotions in the story if I continue reading.

I wish I was more in the scene with Elise. If you just wanted to provide what horrifies her in the next sentence, could you have her stumble out of the bus, just catching herself? Something to get us there with her/make us really get a sense of her character right off the bat.Ninja Girl

I might be off base because I've never read a cozy mystery, but there just wasn't enough of a hook here for me.

I do like getting her name up front and I like that she's just stepped off the bus--that gives me an immediate sense of who and where we are. I have some suggestions:

First, gazed/horror is the wrong combo. Find a better verb.

Second, I think you stopped one description too soon. I can see this opening serving one of two purposes: Set the immediate problem or show characterization. But for either of those to work, we have to see what she sees.

If the thing she's looking at is actually horrific, then you need to describe it but you don't need to tell us she's in horror. "... and gazed at the corpses littered up and down the hotel circle drive." We infer horror.

If, however, it's not something horrific and you're using it to show her overreaction to something stupid, then keep "horror" but give us something character building. "... and gazed in horror at the never-ending sea of pastel buildings."

But if it's not actually showing us something horrible or giving us characterization, then I think it's the wrong kind of opening t use.

No. Mostly because it's a cozy, so I think I'd be disappointed that there isn't likely to be anything actually horrible there at the airport (or exciting horrible, since all airports are horrible). Now, if there really were something horrible, that'd be a different thing altogether!

No. This feels like a false set up--I doubt she is gazing around at anything truly horrific but is only displeased by the traffic or something. I'd rather get a glimpse of what she's horrified by than hear that she's horrified.

This is a classic case of "telling rather than showing." You tell me Elsie is horrified, but I don't see what she sees and I don't have any reason to empathize with her horror. I'm sure the paragraph continues with a description of what she sees, but the opening itself lacks that necessary punch.

No. As others have mentioned, horrible is pretty much the default setting for airports. Specifics might help, either in terms of what's unusual about this particular setting's flavor of horrible, or why her experience of the horror is unique (for example, if she had agoraphobia or an intense aversion to security agents).

No. Sorry! Gaze and horror don't quite fit together. Gaze is leaisurely; gazing around doesn't imply a sense of urgency that horror would require. I agree with the commenter who suggested you describe what she sees and let the reader fill in the emotion.

No, too much telling instead of showing. It would help if you add more to the sentence, showing us what she's looking at. That would ground us in the setting and in the character. I suspect she's overreacting to her new surroundings.